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Speaking Out
In his successful Creative Storytelling , Jack Zipes showed how storytelling is a rich and powerful tool for self-expression and for building children's imaginations. In Speaking Out , this master storyteller goes further, speaking out against rote learning and testing and for the positive force within storytelling and creative drama during the K-12 years.
For the past four years, Jack Zipes has worked with the Neighborhood Bridges Program of the Children's Theatre Company of Minneapolis, taking his storytelling techniques into inner-city schools. Speaking Out is in part a record of the transformations storytelling can work on the minds and lives of young people. But it is also a vivid and exhilarating demonstration of a different kind of education - one built from deep inside each child.
Speaking Out is a book for storytellers, educators, parents, and anyone who cares about helping kids find within themselves the keys to imagination.
For the past four years, Jack Zipes has worked with the Neighborhood Bridges Program of the Children's Theatre Company of Minneapolis, taking his storytelling techniques into inner-city schools. Speaking Out is in part a record of the transformations storytelling can work on the minds and lives of young people. But it is also a vivid and exhilarating demonstration of a different kind of education - one built from deep inside each child.
Speaking Out is a book for storytellers, educators, parents, and anyone who cares about helping kids find within themselves the keys to imagination.
324 pages, Paperback
First published July 10, 2004
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About the author
Jack D. Zipes
152 books245 followersJack David Zipes is a retired Professor of German at the University of Minnesota. He has published and lectured extensively on the subject of fairy tales, their linguistic roots, and argued that they have a "socialization function". According to Zipes, fairy tales "serve a meaningful social function, not just for compensation but for revelation: the worlds projected by the best of our fairy tales reveal the gaps between truth and falsehood in our immediate society." His arguments are avowedly based on the neo-Marxist critical theory of the Frankfurt School.
Zipes enjoys using droll titles for his works like Don't Bet on the Prince and The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Ridinghood.
He completed a PhD in comparative literature at Columbia University. Zipes taught at various institutions before heading German language studies at the University of Minnesota. He has retranslation of the complete fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm.
Zipes enjoys using droll titles for his works like Don't Bet on the Prince and The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Ridinghood.
He completed a PhD in comparative literature at Columbia University. Zipes taught at various institutions before heading German language studies at the University of Minnesota. He has retranslation of the complete fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm.
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June 22, 2020I read Speaking Out: Storytelling and Creative Drama for Children by Jack Zipes. This book emphasizes the importance of youth voice and creative storytelling in childhood and how that teaches kids to become active and critical thinkers in society. Storytelling allows people to examine their struggles and also explore alternatives. In stories, there is always a "happy ending", which Zipes refers to as utopia. Without the idea of utopia, people do not and cannot seek progress. With it, storytellers are able to expose human injustices and challenge the status quo.
Zipes says that storytelling gives the storyteller the chance to share wisdom, and most importantly, build meaningful community with its listeners and fellow storytellers. It helps students learn how to become part of a community; through storytelling, people learn how to see life through others’ eyes and understand the struggles and joys across class and culture boundaries. In addition, stories often carry metaphors of reality in which youth can discuss the social, political and cultural problems of the stories and learn how to carry that over into the real world.
He emphasizes that storytelling in media and even mainstream theater has been quite tricky. Those who create commercials, commentate on news shows, host talk shows, or write/edit for sensationalist newspapers and magazines are not storytellers. Their goal is to amuse, entertain, distract, and sell. True storytellers have the responsibility to the people. As a result, many tales are anti-authoritarian responses to the status quo.
Although this book focuses mostly on performance storytelling, I believe it is very applicable to storytelling through media. In youth programs at SPNN, MTN and similar places, youth get the opportunity to explore stories important to them. They learn how to tell these stories in their unique ways. This is important because youth voice is often left out. Giving students a chance to explore issues that are important to them and putting it on television, the internet, or other places, really allows them to get a wider view of their community and understand their role in it.
The book also has many theater exercises aimed to improve critical thinking. It helps train them to avoid the regurgitation of information. For example, one exercise calls students to explore alternative endings to the story The Pied Piper. A mirror game asks students to mimic and stare at each other for several minutes in the exploration of human discomfort. A statue game asks youth to revive a popular story with a posed scene, then those outside of the story are asked to manipulate and change the scene and story. Although these exercises may not be immediately applicable to youth media programs, they seem crucial in team-building and helping them to build on their critical thinking, creativity and personal voice.
The youth I work with are the storytellers that I have read about. They are challenging the status quo and exploring alternatives to problems simply by exposing issues that are important to them. Youths’ stories are so often neglected by adults that the very act of telling their own stories is an alternative in itself. It makes me wonder, how can we keep programs like Set It Up at SPNN fresh? How do we continue to avoid creating media for media's sake? How do we stay focused on creating media stories for the sake of the youth we work with? It is a question that I have been exploring since I started at SPNN.
Zipes says that storytelling gives the storyteller the chance to share wisdom, and most importantly, build meaningful community with its listeners and fellow storytellers. It helps students learn how to become part of a community; through storytelling, people learn how to see life through others’ eyes and understand the struggles and joys across class and culture boundaries. In addition, stories often carry metaphors of reality in which youth can discuss the social, political and cultural problems of the stories and learn how to carry that over into the real world.
He emphasizes that storytelling in media and even mainstream theater has been quite tricky. Those who create commercials, commentate on news shows, host talk shows, or write/edit for sensationalist newspapers and magazines are not storytellers. Their goal is to amuse, entertain, distract, and sell. True storytellers have the responsibility to the people. As a result, many tales are anti-authoritarian responses to the status quo.
Although this book focuses mostly on performance storytelling, I believe it is very applicable to storytelling through media. In youth programs at SPNN, MTN and similar places, youth get the opportunity to explore stories important to them. They learn how to tell these stories in their unique ways. This is important because youth voice is often left out. Giving students a chance to explore issues that are important to them and putting it on television, the internet, or other places, really allows them to get a wider view of their community and understand their role in it.
The book also has many theater exercises aimed to improve critical thinking. It helps train them to avoid the regurgitation of information. For example, one exercise calls students to explore alternative endings to the story The Pied Piper. A mirror game asks students to mimic and stare at each other for several minutes in the exploration of human discomfort. A statue game asks youth to revive a popular story with a posed scene, then those outside of the story are asked to manipulate and change the scene and story. Although these exercises may not be immediately applicable to youth media programs, they seem crucial in team-building and helping them to build on their critical thinking, creativity and personal voice.
The youth I work with are the storytellers that I have read about. They are challenging the status quo and exploring alternatives to problems simply by exposing issues that are important to them. Youths’ stories are so often neglected by adults that the very act of telling their own stories is an alternative in itself. It makes me wonder, how can we keep programs like Set It Up at SPNN fresh? How do we continue to avoid creating media for media's sake? How do we stay focused on creating media stories for the sake of the youth we work with? It is a question that I have been exploring since I started at SPNN.
November 25, 2018
Attempts to be culturally conscious but the data is frankly outdated and many of the terms and theories have been replaced with more modern CRT and Antiracist teaching strategies. Some great content on child empowerment and agency.
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July 4, 2009Must have for the readers theatre and creative drama folk.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews